Breakeven
by TheNewBrawler
Summary: When something breaks, it rarely breaks even. A relationship in three stages. A story in three parts. *slash*
1. 1

_Disclaimer – I don't own Tekken._

_Old, old stuff. I started this a while back as just practice drabbles, but lo and behold, it started to form a narrative. It was actually meant to be the original Vertigo, before that twirled off in a different direction. However, it may still retain aspects of that fic. :P _

_This fiction shall be in three parts. All three parts are nearly completed, so expect quick updates._

_Note - I know the new canon name for TT2!Forrest is spelt "Forest." However, I was three quarters/ practically finished this fic when it was confirmed, and so "Forest" shall be "Forrest" for this fic only. Also in this fic he is younger than his canon counterpart. For years I thought Forrest was nineteen when he debuted. I wrote this fic with that and his old characterization in mind. So bear with me; a couple of AU features._

Breakeven

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.

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He'd noted the gathering crowds of young men slinking from the cover of shadow, sidling from behind dustbins and half rotted billboards, dressed in torn t-shirts and holey jeans and scuffed sneakers. One of the young men has a white scar slitting down his left cheek, and upon catching Forrest's eye, his smirk is full of broken teeth.

In a blur of movement, he attempts to shower down a barrage of kicks from above. Forrest ducks, pulls down his hand, curls his fist and strikes the man up in a vicious uppercut. The thug crashes to the floor and lays belly up; starfish style.

A silence creeps around the surrounding bystanders. Forrest straightens up, eyeing each and every one, until a string of mock clapping shatters the silence like lazy gunshots.

This boy is different from the others. His wild red hair is tamed by a pair of biker goggles, his boots are hob nailed and the look in his eyes has a slow burning, brutal intensity. He hooks his fingers through the loops of his jeans and imitates the smirk of his fallen lackey. His teeth are white and sharkish.

"Awww..." He dishes out a parade of lightening fast kicks, narrowly missing the end of Forrest's nose. "Is Daddy's baby finally come out to play with the big boys?"

Forrest doesn't blink. He picks up his bag, slings it over his shoulder, and begins to walk away. The spectators explode into jeers. The man behind him swears and spits.

"Well, well," he drawls, drawing up his leg in a warning stance. "Wouldn't expect any less from the golden boy, would we?"

"Wouldn't expect anymore from you," Forrest murmurs as the distance between them grows with each stride. "A thug trained by a coward. No surprise there."

The grins on the circling faces fade and some of them step back, behind the dustbins and billboards. Forrest fights to stop himself from pausing, for now it seems the very air is stung with ice.

A swerved kick blows the bag from Forrest's shoulder, sending groceries and plastic flying. Another deflects off his waist, almost winding him, but Forrest catches his arm under the crook of Hwoarang's knee and sends him spinning back. He hadn't even seen him _move._

"C'mon then," Hwoarang juggles on his feet, his eyes black from fury. "If you have the balls to insult my master, then you can face me and I'll _break _your balls."

"Your master was a criminal who trashed dojos merely for the fun of it," Forrest gets to his knees; gathers the ingredients and piles them back in the remains of the bag. Heat is beginning to scuttle through his blood; his skin is flushing and his heart pounds raw and loud in his head. "My father trashed him at the second king of Iron fist. Returned the favour, so to speak."

"See that's funny. Cos' I'm about to trash you."

They trash the alley, the nearby recycling bins, tearing down posters with mislaid kicks and sprawling fists. In turn, they trash each other, and Forrest is deaf to the hustlers crowding them in sweaty droves and their baying cries of encouragement. He's never had a fight like _this_ before, never felt the sticky mingle of blood and sweat on his brow, never felt the wiring of his limbs untangle in clear, barbarous jabs or how his veins sing with how _alive _he feels.

Hwoarang is an infernal hurricane, his kicks craning and closing in blurs of swiping lines. His hair is a flaming glisten beneath the summer sun, matched only by the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth, but his eyes are hungry and vibrant and burn through Forrest's head.

When Baek Doo San and Marshall Law find them, there is a brief tousle to break them apart. It's only when they have their particular student panting in their arms, do they recognise each other and the bad blood from years back begins to boil.

As Forrest is dragged away, feverish with a new, dangerous heat settling into his bones, does Hwoarang catch his eye and smirk.

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.

.

_Tap. Tap. Tap._

The night is a warm wrap around him. His dreams fuzz and blur at the edges as once again, something hard and small bounces off the frame to his bedroom window.

_Tap. Tap. Tap._

Forrest growls. He pulls his legs free of the duvet, leaving it a crumpled mass on his frayed old mattress. He struggles to open his eyes, rubbing away sleep with the backs of his fists. He shambles towards the window frame, cursing as he stubs his toe on the dresser. The night has laid its hands on his bedroom and in doing so, morphs his furniture into dark, shapeless blocks.

He pulls the window up and jumps at a creeping whisper.

"Hey, Juliet."

The glares of the street lamps reflect off a pair of battered biking goggles. The boy who sports them fastens a cigarette to his smirking lips and supplies Forrest with a steadfast wink.

Forrest slams the window down.

_Tap. Tap. Tap._

_Shit._

When he finally opens the front door, Hwoarang ducks inside and in passing, taps his ashes inside his mother's best vase.

"What do you want?"

Forrest eyes the dark incline of the stairs as Hwoarang, ignoring his question, heads straight for the kitchen.

"You cook, right? Good. I'm starving."

"Not at two o'clock in the goddamn morning..."

"Yeah, well, now you do."

Forrest has a habit of surprising himself. This comes in full force as he heats up the wok in the tiny kitchen, glowering at the grinning punk with the hobnailed boots. It's not like he knows a great many people his age, and well, as long as it doesn't become a habit, once doesn't hurt, does it?

A week later Forrest will admire all the pebble dents, old and recent, in the frame of his window and wonder how he could have ever been so naive.

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.

.

The old Korean recipe book is laid between them on the table. Forrest, fighting to hide his excitement at the prospect of new recipes, wets his lips and tries to test the man who's dabbing at a particular page with a grubby finger.

"Why are you in America, anyway?"

"Master wants you to try this recipe. Somethin' about what his mom used to make."

Forrest sighs, and finally giving in, reaches for the book. He squints at the recipe, noting each detail, each ingredient and the like, before he grins and shakes his head.

"Seriously? You can't make this yourself? It's easy."

"I can't cook," His voice is a mewling drawl as he props his feet up on the opposite chair. "That's woman's work."

"You know we could fall out."

"Heh. Can you do it or not?"

Forrest raises an eyebrow. Any new dish is a new challenge, even if it is a deceptively simple one. He gets to his feet and rips a sticky note off the fridge.

"Fine. Just let me write down the ingredients."

As Forrest scribbles, Hwoarang leans over the book. Darkness seems to dent his brow.

"Somethin' his mom used to make." And then, a pause. The chair groans as he rocks back on it, lifting the front legs off the floor. The next words he utters are a whisper, more to himself than anything, but Forrest hears them anyway. "Never had a mom to make me anything."

Forrest is suddenly conscious of Hwoarang eyeing each and every family portrait, each beach holiday and wedding and Christmas, splayed across each table surface and mantel like the messy length of a personal timeline. Forrest swallows, feeling suddenly guilty for a reason he can't pinpoint, and tries his first question again.

"Are you here for a martial arts tournament?"

"No. Master Baek had business in America. Wanted me to come, so I did."

Suspicious as always, he lights another cigarette, and dangling it over his forearm, hovers it a little close to Forrest's wrist.

"Yo, is that a problem Daddy's boy?"

Forrest doesn't even budge.

"No," he replies calmly. "I just need to know how much stock I need if I'm going to be cooking so much."

"Huh."

As Forrest washes up an uncharacteristic quiet settles between them, clouding the air like a fine dust. Its midday, his parents are out and he's started _lying_, of all things, started devising plans to try to cater to this new, secret friendship that downright baffles him.

"You cook, right?"

"Yeah." Forrest places the dishes on the rack. Behind him, Hwoarang clicks his tongue, as if in thought. The tips of Forrest's ears are reddening, for some unfathomable reason. "What else did you think I did?"

"Heh. But you fight too, right?"

Forrest turns slowly back to Hwoarang, wiping his hands on the dishcloth.

"No."

He expects a response seated in aggression, but instead Hwoarang delivers his usual smirk and rocks back on the dining chair.

"We'll see," is all he says.

.

.

.

Jin Kazama is wired into Hwoarang's skin, drawn tight inside of him, bucked up against his lungs and liver and heart. Locked in his ribcage, curled around the stomach with his head to the base of Hwoarang's spine. Forrest can see Jin, pressed up against the scalding furies of Hwoarang's dark, angry eyes, can feel the gusts of Jin's breath slipping between his friend's lips as he reduces the punching bag to fabric and sand.

Forrest doesn't train when Hwoarang is like…well, like this, with Jin pumping off his core in angry, sweaty waves. Hwoarang trains relentlessly, and even if every kick and thrust and arch is pure perfection, dissatisfaction rips through his face as he examines each technique, each method new and old, with all the vigour of a starving man.

Jin is the centre of Hwoarang's world. He dictates, with silent and unknown authority, every choice and action for his friend's life and goals. Jin _is_ Hwoarang's world.

Forrest wonders how long he can cater to Hwoarang's needs, whether this fragile little friendship they've strung up is enough to appease the man's inner fire; whether the midnight training sessions and the heckling chats and the cooking can steady him, if only for a while.

But he isn't Jin Kazama.

"What are you looking at?"

If Hwoarang perceives even the tiniest flaw in his training, then as a result his temper is as black and as unpredictable as thunder.

"Nothing," Forrest doesn't dare go near the mat, save the panting, scary Korean plastered all over it. "I was just y'know…observing."

Hwoarang's eyes illuminate. There's nothing fresh about it. It's overly bright, dulled, a little nasty. Forrest inwardly groans. Whatever tiny crimes Hwoarang can concoct from thin air, he's about to be tried for. It's an outlet. Forrest knows this. He grimaces and gets to his feet, reaching for his drawstring bag.

"I'm not in the mood, Hwoarang."

"In the mood for what?" Hwoarang crosses his arms. The tried smile is more a smirk and already he is beginning to jitter with creeping, undefinable energy. "I haven't done anything yet."

"Yeah, well," Forrest spies the door. It is, well of course it would be, wouldn't it, behind the mat and Hwoarang. "I've gotta get back before you _do_ do anything. My turn to cook dinner, y'know."

"No," Hwoarang frowns. "I wanted a spar. A proper one on one."

"Ask your instructor," Forrest says gently. He stretches and sighs. "It's too late, Hwoarang. I sat here and watched you train for the past two hours. Why didn't you say?"

A white blur hurtles towards his chest. A foot halts, barely a centimetre from Forrest's stomach. Hwoarang is still smirking, but every muscle in his cheek seems to smart.

"I'm saying now," he says lowly, prodding Forrest hard with his big toe. "I want a fight."

"I can see that," Forrest's heart is thudding, but he keeps himself stiff and still. "I have to go. I don't think my fight is the kind of fight you're looking for."

Hwoarang's eyes tighten at the corners.

"What the hell does that mean?" He half hisses, pushing Forrest further back with his foot. It's a soft pressure, well, soft for Hwoarang, but Forrest can sense the power climbing within the muscles of Hwoarang's leg and he knows if Hwoarang so desired, he could shatter his ribcage like paper.

"For god sakes Hwoarang, I'm not a…" Forrest struggles not to stumble over his own feet. He visibly swallows. Hwoarang's lips begin to part at the sight, his teeth riding over onto his bottom lip. Forrest jumps as the cold press of the wall hits his back. "I-I'm not a damn outlet."

"Outlet?" Hwoarang finally swings his leg down. "Who the hell said anything about _projecting,_ Daddy's Boy?"

It's the nickname he despises. It's a warning sign. Forrest can bite, or he can do what Hwoarang wants.

Hwoarang catches the end of his thumb with the flashing white of his square, blunt teeth. He sniggers as Forrest drops his bag to the floor.

Well, that had an easy answer.

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.

.

Forrest has always had this fear of conflict, of situations striding madly out of hand and the window of life crashing through. His future has never been solid, never been mapped up in exact lines and so he follows routine right down to the knuckle.

Hwoarang, on the other hand, is turbulence personified.

He can't believe he's dumb enough, weak enough, _emotional _enough that if all it takes is to get him on that damn bike he hates so much is a cocky smirk and the barest implication that he might leave without him. That all the bastard has to do is rev the engine a certain way and there he is, tripping down the stairs and sneaking past the dojo and carrying Hwoarang's favourite meal in a Tupperware under his arm. That Hwoarang licks his lips when he sees him and it makes all the hair on his neck prickle and Hwoarang isn't looking at the Tupperware, he's looking at _him_ and it drives him mad. He hates how he purrs _hang on tight now_ and pushes his back further into Forrest's lap then he needs to. He hates how when they get there Hwoarang and Baek exchange glances as if this is part of some elaborate joke he's excluded from. He hates how his father would skin him alive if he found out about him being tutored by Baek Doo San of all people and his pupil with the bad dye job and just, well, _this._

Forrest hates how he has this feeling, this knowledge that he'd follow Hwoarang anywhere and do everything he wanted because he doesn't even have to ask; he just smirks and nods and beckons, and Forrest is just _lost._

Forrest hates how he's so dumb and weak and emotional and so, _so_ lovesick.

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"I'm too tame for you."

Hwoarang's bike is parked down the alleyway of Marshall's dojo; the air is rancid with filth and the stink of the gutters. If this bothers Hwoarang, he doesn't show it. He's down one knee, the crook of his jeans sodden with rain water, his fingers yanking at Forrest's zipper. The air is pressed with a grey, wintery drizzle. Moisture dribbles down Forrest's cheeks, down the arch of his chin, dripping in the curve of collar bone and chest and in the place where his heart beats.

Weeks have passed. A muggy summer with overcast skies, spent in stuffy dojos and kitchens slick with sweat. A sunny, crisply brisk September. And an October that drowns everything and everyone in slashes of wet, slushy lines.

He tries again. The movement of his lips are as small an action as the gentle shift in his breathing, and he's surprised when Hwoarang hears him this time.

"I'm too tame for you."

He feels the beginnings of short, jagged nails raking his lower stomach. Hwoarang hisses, pissed at being distracted, and slides up to his full height.

"What?"

"You'll get bored eventually," Forrest says dully. He leans back against the bike, squinting at the cloudy hang of the sky. "You'll just move on to someone else."

"You're worse than a girl," Hwoarang catches the end of Forrest's chin. He clicks his tongue against his teeth, a common habit and one that spells nonchalance, but the moody monochrome of his eyes seem to intensify. The moment passes and he sniffs. "Anyway, you shouldn't say such stupid things."

"Why?"

A kiss. Hard, dry, demanding, on his lips.

Hwoarang catches Forrest's wrist, and guides it to his own belt. A lump rises in Forrest's throat and his breath comes out in quick, gasping gusts.

Hwoarang leans in closer. The bike creaks with their added weight.

"Cos' it ain't true."


	2. 2

_Sorry for the delay in updating._

_Disclaimer – I don't own Tekken._

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Nothing lasts forever.

A year has dragged its feet through wars, through pillage and sorrow and horror. Even in the great, untouchable cocoon of America, Forest feels it. The war in the east scuttles across the seas, tangles the clouds in smoke and fire, and whispers through each radio and television and webpage.

Somehow along the line, Hwoarang came crawling back to America.

Forest is behind his mother's house, stacking away vegetable boxes and sorting the rotten fruit from the fresh. His father hasn't returned from Japan. A hasty phone call revealed something about illegal work and a new, shiny money plan. He had only request. For Forest to join him.

His mother, enraged, firmly told him no.

Forest thinks he's too old for adventures. His mother, a retired medic, has been travelling around and aiding the wounded from the recent bombings. The cramped, slummy suburbs of his hometown have been untouched. It's the big cities, the bustling and gold licked streets of San Francisco, which have been torched by the icy wrath of Jin Kazama.

The boxes are light, but awkward to hold, as they are riddled with splinters. Something small and stinging sinks into Forest's thumb and he swears; lifts it to his mouth, and sucks.

"Doesn't that bring back memories?"

Hands. Warm, intrusive, slipping under his shirt and riding higher. Forest shifts, sighing, and peels away from Hwoarang.

"I heard you were back in the neighborhood."

"You miss me?"

Forest is aware of Hwoarang's eyes skimming him up and down as he piles each box, one after the other, on the growing pile.

"No." Forest sets down the last box, arching up his back. He zips up his parker, and heads back towards the kitchen. "I've had too much to think about."

"You won't change your mind, huh? Too busy sitting pretty in suburbia."

"Don't be an ass." Forest winces at the break in his voice. Hwoarang smirks. That same smirk. A whole year and that hasn't changed. "This place isn't exactly _pretty_. And what the hell are you back for?" His fists clench in his pockets. He's stopped, halfway to the door and halfway to Hwoarang. "I thought you were planning on bringing down the Mishima Empire."

"I am," Hwoarang drawls. He cracks his head from side to side and then stills, drinking in Forest with his eyes. His snickers but there is no levity in the sound. "With or without you."

"It was a pretty bad fight," Forest mumbles. He suddenly recalls white topped hospitals puncturing the sky, flashes of tangling red wire on LCDs and the furious, unforgiving hurt in cut grey eyes. Tightness climbs into his chest. "Are you...better?"

"Never been better," Hwoarang scratches the end of his nose, seemingly bored. "But if you're not gonna touch what I've got to offer, then I better split."

Forest's shoulders slump. But Hwoarang is looking the other way and maybe, maybe it's better that he doesn't...

"Anyway..." There is a quivering nick of anticipation lining the edge of his tone. His scrutiny is alive, revitalized, on Forest. "I've got a hot piece of ass waiting for me by the bike."

It's most possibly is a lie. Forest isn't stupid, he knows plenty well how Hwoarang plays his games, but it doesn't stop the droop in his shoulders. He tries his best to work his feet back to the door, back to his mother and his chores, but his neck turns of its own accord and his glare withers under Hwoarang's triumphant smirk.

He slams the door behind him. He stops himself waiting by the window, even if he does hear the bike rumble to life. Forest fixes his fists on his knees and tells himself to stop, stop, _stop_ thinking. Instead, Forest leaves for his bedroom. He locks the door, trammels his face in his pillow and waits until his heartbeat loosens and falls.

.

.

It's a wasted exercise to try and clear his thoughts, for the memories push themselves back in his mind and he's relived the moment of that day so many times it illuminates, clear cut and cruel, in his head.

It had been the day before Hwoarang was to go back to Japan. His wounds inflicted by Jin Kazama had been severe, so severe he'd been bedridden in the tournament's hospital for months. Forest, hearing of the news from Paul, hadn't slept, hadn't eaten, hadn't _thought _of anything else for those months. The weeks had trudged on, in which each moment was numb and endless and ridden with anguish, of _what ifs _and _oh god _and _if only…_

To his shock and secret delight, he'd heard Baek was returning Hwoarang to America for a sort while, merely to allow him to recover completely before they would return to their training. Even he if didn't see him, it was confirmation enough that Hwoarang was well.

It was inevitable that they would be reunited.

It was so stupid of him, so brainless, that he had assumed Hwoarang hadn't wished to be back, was neither here nor there in his feelings about _him_; all the best they'd ever had was a fleeting grope, a teasing kiss, an intense spar. Forest had thought (so tactless, so fucking tactless…) that their time together had been viewed as nothing more than a brief, fumbling fling.

He hadn't thought, then, about how Hwoarang's fair weather friends were picked off one by one by time and trivia. He hadn't thought why his body was the only one that warmed the dojo, when he used to sit and watch in silence as Hwoarang would belt the sandbags. He hadn't thought how Hwoarang would rain down rocks at his window every midnight, get irritated if he mentioned Xiaoyu, how he would ply him with verbal jabs too spiteful to be playful and then watch for a reaction, only to be confused by Forest's light and oblivious rebuffs. He hadn't thought about the feel of a hand, hot and hasty, clawing down his chest or the taste of gasoline and peppermint and smoke intermingled on his tongue.

When Hwoarang had returned, just off his crutches, he was gravely pale, gaunt, sickly. His eyes were tinctured with festering storms, his body taut with unimaginable, wrathful tension. The groves in his cheeks were sunken deep, the spaces beneath his eyes punched purple; from violence or nightmares, Forest couldn't guess.

The heckling boy from before was well and truly dead.

Forest fed him, trained with him, listened to him. They didn't touch each other once, only brushed knuckles in a brotherly fashion and Forest begun to believe that their brief tousle the year before had transcended into a close, rare friendship. And it hurt him. But that was okay. If Hwoarang was alright, if it helped Hwoarang, well…that was fine. Forest could live with that.

But Jin was there, in Hwoarang's head, at least. Submerged into his every breathing moment. Infused with a peculiar care into his memories, that interwove itself into his dreams, that he said were full of blood red eyes and the cutting caress of bristled black feathers.

It was all Hwoarang talked about. The stuff of nightmares.

The roots of the coveted rivalry had begun to twist, to grow. It finally flourished to the point of a long nurtured, all consuming _hatred._ He began to mutter about making plans, about saving the world, about ripping down Jin's newly established rein from the inside out. Or as Forest secretly saw it; a way to get even.

The time finally came. Hwoarang was to return to Japan, to seize his destiny, to face Kazama once again. The night before Hwoarang was set to travel with Baek, Forest was awoken by pebbles bouncing off his window frame. The night was dastardly in its heat. Forest's head felt swollen, alien on his shoulders, and his gut wrangled with a strange apprehension.

He'd figured Hwoarang was hungry.

He always had been brainless.

He'd yanked him through the door, all the buttons broken on the front of his shirt, and slammed him against the rumbling burn of a bike. Hwoarang had kissed Forest before, demanding and harsh and a little sloppy, but this time Forest felt as if he was being _devoured. _All the flare and fire and friction came tumbling out of Hwoarang in that one moment, so starved he seemed, so _rife_ with need.

Forest, disorientated, had broken away. Hwoarang, undeterred, reared up his bike, and told Forest in a rough, rasping shadow of his voice, to get on the back and not ask any questions. Forest, too ruffled to argue, merely did as he was told.

Hwoarang rode like a madman to the old dojo, the one where they used to train and laugh and eat. Upstairs was a grotty bedsit. Hwoarang wasn't fussy. Forest didn't have much choice in the matter.

Hwoarang kissed him again, hungry and desperate and dangerous, and all Forest could do was respond and then they hit the bed and the whole night dissolved into _sweat _and _salt_ and _sensation._

The next morning, Hwoarang was nowhere to be seen. Forest, sore and aching, sloped back home.

Hwoarang arrived later that day. With a proposition.

His expression. His damn _face _when Forest had refused. There was no sound, nothing at all, but Forest swore he heard something, heard a tangible _crack _somewhere.

Spookily, Hwoarang didn't say anything. He just stood there and _stared_. Not moving. Not. Shifting. One. Limb.

Forest wanted him to leave. That enduring glower was unnerving him, flaying him to the raw nerve, and the walls of his old home seemed to close in on the two of them and Forest tried to think, tried to fight and find in himself some part of him that would reel in the words and say the right, romantic thing. But he couldn't. It was a vicious blank.

Forest could sense the old barrier between them, creeping higher and higher, until it snapped shut and Hwoarang's eyes were glossed over with his old, beaten steel.

"Fuck you then."

He locked his thumbs around his jeans, like he had when they first met in the gungy backstreets of San Francisco, and was gone through the door.

He'd left far too quickly, even for him. In less than ten seconds the bike was a dwindling mewl on the wind and Forest stood alone, closed in, in the kitchen shadowed by the late afternoon.

Forest possessed a moped. It was a scraped, scrappy heap of junk, but it was competent enough to get the groceries and fetch fresh stock and the like. When Forest, furiously rubbing his eyes, finally managed to gather himself and go inside, did he see it on its side and half smashed.

Someone had given it a nice, hard kick.

.

.

The memories carve new, anxious holes in his brain.

He wakes up one morning, sweaty and sticky and panting. He wonders if it's the recollection of _that_ night, but there is a steady _thump _between his ears and nausea laps at his stomach.

His mother's face boils with more fervour than his when she checks his fever.

She demands he remains sanctified in his bed clothes.

Maybe it's better this way.

He doesn't have to _think._

.

.

.

So much rain.

"Forest! Forest, you there?"

It's like the past few months have been measured in drowning slashes of wet.

"Please be here. Jesus, _somebody_..."

It scratches away at the busted tiling of his bedroom roof. He's partly sick with a fever. Sick of the damp in his throat and the creak in his muscles and the dull, dank depths of boredom.

The weight on his eyelids shift as there is ruckus below. His mother's voice climbs in high, hysterical tones and then there is the rushed, ungainly attempt of a male voice trying to be polite.

Illness dissipates like water vapor.

When Forest staggers into the living room, he is greeted with his mother warningly brandishing a ladle and the panting, wild eyed vision of Hwoarang.

He barely has time to lift his tongue when Hwoarang dashes past the table, seizes his t-shirt and reels him into the living room.

"Master's hurt," He hisses, torn nails digging into Forest's chest. His goggles are missing, his hair loose and hanging over his eyes, to which Forest notes, are glossed with moisture. Hwoarang repeats his mantra, spitting through gritted teeth. "Master's hurt."

Forest's head spins in circles. His fever pounds, furious and fast, through his temples and filters the light about him too bright. Groaning, he breaks away from Hwoarang and massages his head.

"How about the hospital?"

"He...we can't," Hwoarang snatches away at his clothes, his hair, breathing viciously through his nose. "You know we can't."

Hwoarang stands back.

The light evens. The fire in Forest's head spills into cool, collected lines.

Hwoarang, breathless, curls his fists into his hair. Forest watches him for a moment, and then...

"Mom."

His mother inches through the door. She eyes Hwoarang, her fingers still latched around the ladle. Forest is sure, well, god damn hopes they'll laugh about it later.

"Hwoarang's friend is in dire need of medical help," He wonders where the words are coming from, for they seem detached, otherly, to his lips. Hwoarang just glances between him and his mother; once, twice, thrice. "Can you help?"

His mother doesn't ask any questions. It's one of the few things they've always had in common.

Hwoarang frets out the back, kicking his feet in the dust. His bike is loaded with her medical supplies. When she reappears, first aid kit strapped to her back, does Hwoarang tense, straighten, and bow.

"Be careful with her," Forest says lowly. Sickness is once again drawing down on his limbs. "If she doesn't come back in one piece, then I'll see _you_ in pieces."

Hwoarang catches his eye. Despite the raging flush of his skin, he grants Forest a quick, impulsive grin.

Forest's fever proceeds to skyrocket.

As they depart into the rain wrecked gloom, Hwoarang's tail light soaking away into nothingness, does Forest return to his bed. In ten minutes, realization hits, and he bolts from his bedroom to the toilet, where he is violently sick.

.

.

That evening, he wakes to the gentle chinking of glasses.

His mother is washing her hands below. Shadow has seeped into the soft lines circulating her eyes. On the table, there is a hot mug of lemon. Forest, his legs shaky, lowers himself down and takes a sip.

"You and that boy," His mother turns off the tap. It squeaks at the effort; water straining in gurgling bursts through the pipes. Her back is bent, compressed, with an unfamiliar weight. "You've met before?"

Forest gulps. The movement sears the burn in his throat. He shudders and takes another sip.

"Y-Yes. Yes we have."

"Hm." Moments pass on in silence. His mother piles the plates in the drawer, but then, she pauses, her fingers hovering over the cupboard. "Son, did you know that you almost had a brother?"

Forest spits the lemon back in the cup.

"Marshall struggled, you see," She still has her back to him. The winter shadows have crept in and gather in inky spots around the one, warm circle of lamplight, sat on the table. "He had a low count. I wasn't one hundred percent myself. We were told that together, we were quite incompatible." She laughs softly, but something bitter, hidden, tugs at the edges of it. "In light of things, now I find that quite funny."

Forest hesitates.

"Mom?"

She shakes her head, suddenly remembering herself.

"But I did fall pregnant. Twins, we were told. Boys. And we were thrilled. I'd never seen Marshall so happy."

She pulls out the drying rack. The plates rattle in their holders.

"I was a few weeks in. Just about showing. Marshall had gone out on business. I was in the kitchen, preparing snacks for the students and the supply tutor. I could hear the next session students laughing in the corridor. It was a nice day. Sunny. Sweet scented."

Forest sits silent beside the table. The steam from his drink warms the cracked skin on his lips.

"It was then that there was this crash. All these angry, loud sounds, coming from the dojo. Somebody was bellowing like a creature possessed. It was horrible. I tried to crouch behind the table, but then in he came. Behind him, I could see the students, even children, beaten and curled up on the floor. Some were trying to crawl away and help the others. The supply teacher I couldn't even see. He was surrounded by a circle of cowering teenagers."

Forest opens his mouth. And then closes it.

"He drove questions at me, again and again, demanding answers for things I knew nothing about. I begged him to stop. I could feel myself growing increasingly wound up until in the end all I could do sob and scream and then he started to advance, come toward me, and I slipped on the floor and my stomach hit the table as I went down. I could only bring up my hands, one on my face, and another on my throbbing stomach. It was stupid. Marshall had taught me basic defense, but right then my mind was numb and I couldn't think. I honestly thought he was going to kill me."

A tiny hairline crack has begun to fracture the edge of Forest's cup.

"It was then that he stopped. The man looked down at me, at my stomach, and then at his hands. He left so quickly, more silent then a shadow, for when I dared look again he was gone."

Forest goes to interrupt, but his mother's voice tears through his words.

"A week later, I woke to blood. I tried to call Marshall but he was out on the tournament. I managed to get Paul, but when he heard the news he was awkward and stuttering and didn't know what to say. Still, I went to the hospital, by myself, the bloodied sheets in a plastic bag. They ran tests. I still remember the nurse coming out of the room, sitting me down, and confirming that I had lost one of my _children_."

She turns back to him. Her cheeks are run with trails of glimmering wet.

"I don't know how I did that," She begins slowly, her voice as soft as the first spark of thunder. "I don't know how I could even touch him, even in the bad way that he was, lying there all cut open with bullets. I've see people without faces. I've seen people lashed with fire. But there he was, barely breathing, and that young man, so desperate, so willing for that...that _man_ to live. And I patched him. I treated him. I bound his injuries and prescribed rest, as if I actually cared about what happened to him. And that boy bowed to me after, took me home on that machine of his, so careful, as if I was made of glass..."

"Mom..." The chair is pushed back. Forest half rises, his mind running in dizzying, pain soaked circles. "Mom..."

As he tries to reach her, his feet slip on the floor. He tries to brace his hand on his table but it almost overturns with the sudden, spontaneous pressure. The lamp falls over, the bulb fizzing out. His mother grabs his hand; pulls him upright.

In the dark, they stare at each other.

.

.

.

He needs air.

It's a cold, brisk, bright night. He's wrapped himself in an old jacket. Despite the sniffle in his nose and the sickness still hanging heavy in his head, he feels oddly light, tempered by something he can't describe.

Forest seats himself on the brick wall facing his street. He used to sit here back when he was a kid, and be a spectator to his father's fights and Paul's rides and his mother's patients. It's as if the years have been measured by these things. As if they will always be, even if his father's hair is splitting grey at the sides and Paul's exhaust pipes are turning black with rust and his mother moves slow but steady. It's as if his whole world is composed of just, well this; these comfortable, narrowing, provincial events, ongoing and forever.

He did think that was all he ever knew.

Until the man, _this_ man, the one who now sails up silently on the bike with the missing wing mirror, came crashing through it, stringing up each fragment of Forest's shattered world and imbuing each one with a new, confusing conflagration of colour.

Hwoarang swings his leg off his bike. With his middle finger, he pushes his goggles up unto his forehead.

Forest buries his hands in the fleecy holes of his pockets.

"I never thought you actually wore those," He blinks up at the sky. "I thought they were just for show."

"Keh. As if I would do anything just for show."

"I can give you a list."

"Piss off."

He expects Hwoarang to sidle closer, armed with further remarks, but he remains solitary and stagnant, leant against his bike.

"Master is better."

"Is he? Good."

"Your Mom…" Hwoarang seems to chew over the words, as if not used to them. "She did well, I..." He observes Forest beneath his eyelashes, and quickly adds; "I did thank her, you know."

"Yeah. She said."

"Hm."

Forest leans his head back against the wall. His eyes flutter shut, blocking out the night and the stars and Hwoarang.

A creak of leather.

Breath, warmed by tobacco, kisses the arch of his face.

Forest's brow indents.

An arm encircles his waist. Nudges up his jumper, revealing a curve of skin and Forest feels a thumb, questioning, teasing, circle his lower stomach.

"I've missed you." Hwoarang's voice is husky, ripe with _something, _but Forest isn't that naïve anymore, but he's still as simple and predictable as ever, for his chest is prickling with a crushing, helpless, happy pain.

"You bastard," Forest hisses. He snaps his eyes open, but refuses to swivel his stare in the direction of that well-worn smirk. "Do you even know what you do to me?"

"Yeah. Why I do it, baby."

"Don't call me that."

"Heh."

Hwoarang 's fingers close around the aching joints of Forest's wrists, pushing him further back, until the wall is a sodden press on his back.

"You do realise I'm sick, right?"

He's expecting a snicker, a smart come back, anything.

But Hwoarang rests his head in the corner of Forest's neck, and just _breathes._

Forest, in accordance, stops breathing.

They stay like that for a while. The evening is a chilly clasp around them. A train rattles along its tracks. There is the low, whispering buzz of a television in the distance.

"I…" Forest's throat throbs. He swallows, his throat lifting into the soft pressure of Hwoarang's mouth, and his heart beats so rapidly it could break through his ribs. "I-I'm going to Japan. With Dad. For the tournament."

Hwoarang stiffens.

"I-I'll…see you there?"

Hwoarang, not moving from Forest's shoulder, trails his fingers down the groves in Forest's wrists. They settle, gently, on the edge of Forest's chin. Hwoarang leans back, his eyes set, his slight, testing smile drying the inside of Forest's mouth.

"Jesus…" Forest weakly pushes him away. "Quit the smooth operator act, okay?"

"It's what I do," Hwoarang replies, but his voice is low and loving and Forest can sense the threads of his world becoming bare, breaking, with each new intoxicating expansion. "And I won't let you forget it."

He closes the gap and Forest's world tumbles, flails, and falls.


	3. 3

_Disclaimer – Don't own Tekken._

_For Razer. Just, you know, for Razer. For being awesome. _

_._

_._

_3_

_._

_._

Forest knew they would be watching the grainy screen of the television hooked up in the old warehouses; each tense, expectant face lined up like a perverse chorus.

And then…

_Jin Kazama missing…_

_The Mishima Zaibatsu is in uproar…_

_National powers have begun to reclaim oil rings and military facilities…_

Forest watches from the busted TV in his father's kitchen. Marshall is at the tournament, still fighting a match with no final voice to herald a winner. The prize money is void. Their reason for being here is as aimless as the leaves cast off in the autumn wind.

He switches it off. Dumps the dishes in the sink. That wasn't the reason he was here. It was the reason his father was here, yeah, of course. But funnily enough, he would have never come here in the first place if his own Dad had tried to pass himself off as reason enough.

_He'd _been the reason.

Forest chuckles. It's an empty sound and one he'd forced from his throat. He continues scrubbing, even when the plates are shining and white and his knuckles become sore from soap and water.

Behind him, the television crackles out a different headline.

.

.

The days morph into weeks.

They haven't got a reason to be here.

And neither has he, not anymore. Even if he spent the previous year sneaking out, cooking large quantities for secret gangs, tending to scrapes and cuts, making all those jokes about being a Good Samaritan. His father's ignorance colours his actions in a large black blot and to Forest it's as if part of his life has been erased.

Japan is a stricken mess, sunken into uproar, but the rioters patrolling the streets do not wear bashed biker goggles or torn chaps, and Forest knows when he is beaten.

As the plane lifts off the ground, he grips the seat until the lining tears.

.

.

Time kills pain like no other. Even if he's adjusted to the old familiar sting prompted by a song on the radio or the discovery of a t-shirt that isn't his, or Paul's trademark smell of mingled smoke and oil.

He keeps the television switched off. The papers are left to wilt on the doorstop. If he closes off the rest of the world, then maybe the worlds of noise and colour and gunfire will collapse onto themselves, into the clean and comfortable slate of ignorance.

_When did I turn into my father?_

Paul looks at him funny. Business is picking up at the dojo, the world recovering in small, shy steps, and Dad is happy and Mum is content but Paul just looks at him funny, and he hates it.

He's packing away the gym equipment, self-assured in his self-imposed isolation, but a shadow falls across him and Paul leans back against the monkey bars, lights up, and closes the door with his foot.

Forest ignores him, folding mats and hanging up sandbags, listening to the occasional shuffle of paper nestled between lips and something stirs on the brink of his memory, and his gut aches so hard he thinks he might throw up.

Paul's inevitable question pricks through the air.

"Who's the girl?"

Forest jangles the keys in his hand.

"It's not a girl." He gestures to the broom and bucket beside Paul. "I need to get there."

"Oh…" He cracks his neck side to side, and stubs the cigarette out on the leather of his knee. "Who's the guy, then?"

Forest is conscious of his mouth closing.

Paul smirks.

"Forget it." Forest looks again at the broom and buckets; sighs, and instead trundles towards the door. "It's nothing."

"Doesn't look like nothing, kid."

The plaster catches in Forest's hair as the door slams behind him.

.

.

Hwoarang didn't care.

Why the fuck would he care? He was a traveler, a free spirit, dodging from lodging to hostel to street, picking and dropping lovers like dandelions, unraveling egos in random spats on sidewalks, and then disappearing with a rumble of his bike as the only evidence he was ever _there._

Forest's cheeks flame as he hits the sandbag. Again, again, again. He's broken all the wooden planks, ripped the padding out of every boxing glove, and even smashed through Paul's bricks.

_I hate you._

Each thrust of his fist erases an imaginary smirk.

_I hate you._

Rotten bastard. Ignorant, proud, beautiful bastard.

In the doorframe Marshall watches him.

Forest lets the bag creak to a halt.

His father stands aside to let him pass. He looks away when Forest catches his eye.

Forest wonders if he looks dark, angry, rife for reproach. He catches sight of himself in the foyer mirror. His eyes are wide and bright and wet.

His Dad moves from the doorway, toward him, hand outstretched, and Forest practically flees upstairs.

What would a bad boy biker see in a weak kneed kitchen wimp, anyway?

.

.

His phone rings.

He'd long since given up looking at the screen. But the voice, timid and a little tired, surprises him.

Xiao's in America. She wants to get away from Japan, she claims. Wants to stay away. There's too much there, too many memories spun into its buildings and roads and hordes of blinking lights and shiny new electronics.

They had written to each other after the third tournament; letters and e-mails and phone calls, pixelated web cams with laggy footage and the promise that they would see each other again. Soon.

It always seemed so far away; one of these illusive slung off promises that you makes lots of but never expect to actually _keep_. But here they are scouring the city centre together, comforted by its mild, mundane amusements and Xiao's hand is a warm weight against his. She speaks non-stop, in a bid to distract them both, but her voice wavers with strain and she presses close to him as they walk. They steal themselves away to a small corner just outside the cinema, shy of the town lake. The sky is lit with stars and it stains her skin in icy slithers of white.

They stand together, leaned up against the wall. Her nails prick into his palm, and the rough collar of her coat brushes against his chin.

Somehow, his hand finds the curve of his cheek and it shocks him, because he did it without thinking. He brushes the shell like turn of her ear and the corner of her eyes where the skin crinkles when she smiles, and she smiles then.

Something catches him, like the sudden snatch of an old memory, and it dances on the rim of his thoughts; a faint heat of yearning, but it passes as she turns her eyes down and steps back.

"I need something new," she says it more to herself than anyone else, twisting her fingers, but he knows what she means. "I can't go back there."

Xiao guides her head onto the corner of his shoulder, fingers tightly locking on his jacket and his eyelids shudder shut as she begins to cry.

Moment pass, soft and slow, punctured by the hiccup in Xiao's sobs and the circles he gently traces on her back.

Forest isn't sure what it is that makes him open his eyes. It could have been the vague scent of tobacco pinching the air or the rumble of an engine being eased down into stagnancy, but when he does open them he sees a man leaned against the opposite rail.

Hwoarang is completely still. He balances a cigarette between his lips, dangles it between his fore fingers and exhales; smoke cloaks his face in grey billows and Forrest can see his stance is casual, leant back against his bike, but his eyes are the colour and consistency of granite.

Xiao pulls away. Hwoarang watches from over her shoulder; he taps his ash on the back tire.

"T-Thank you Forest," He offers a tissue and she takes it, giggling lightly. "But I better get back before this gets awkward."

"It's never awkward."

"I think you're the only person in the world who says that and means it. Truly."

Forest half expects Hwoarang to sneer and speed off, but he's turned toward the lake, draping himself over the railings.

He lowers his gaze to Xiao and smiles.

"Where will you go, then? If you can't go back?"

"Someplace different, I guess." She zips up her coat, and shakes her hair free. No more pigtails. "I don't think I know what I wanted to begin with. What I was expecting."

Forest's eyes slide to the figure silhouetted against dark water.

"You should see the world." It's a lame line, set for soap operas, but her irises glitter and she gives his hand one final squeeze.

"I do know this," she pokes him in the chest. "I'll miss you."

"Hey, I'm a phone call away."

She gives him a final wave, turns, and is gone.

Forest pulls his collar up. Sucks on his lower lips, chapped with frost, and stares straight ahead.

The whites of Hwoarang's eyes spark as their gazes meet.

That's when Forest sees it.

The skin running down Hwoarang's left cheek is mottled, bunched, as if poorly sewn together. The outline of a crude, white scar and Hwoarang smirks and looks away.

.

.

.

He buries his hands in his pockets, which are frayed through, and the air is too cold for this.

"I waited for you." He says slowly. "I waited for something. A phone call. A note. A goddamn text. Just..." He tears his eyes from Hwoarang's face, which is too still, too uncharacteristically serious. "Just _something_."

Hwoarang stubs his cigarette on his jeans. Like Paul. So like Paul, and Forest is wondering for the first time about his father and their best friend.

The minutes wade in. The mist is low and thick, and Forest gazes across the water, but the lights on the other side are swallowed whole and it's just like the silent, hollow cove of the ocean. Maybe that is more romantic. He doesn't know. Maybe he doesn't care.

"I would have done." Hwoarang's tone is matter-of-fact, unaffected, but he flexes his fingers; open, closed, open, closed. "If it hadn't been so batshit. I might have…"

His words trail off.

His thumb absently toys with the edge of his cheek.

Forest's knuckles crack in his gloves. He pulls away from the chill of the bar. He shifts along, head downcast, until his fingers curl into the fabric of Hwoarang's too thin coat.

"You think that I wouldn't have waited?"

Hwoarang grins, but its irony is bitter, and shakes his head.

"Not many people have waited for me."

"And you thought I was one of those?"

Hwoarang doesn't answer.

"Because I'm not." Forest leans in close, analyzing the hard straights of Hwoarang's nose, the stony glint set deep in manila eyes. "I never was, and I never want to be."

Forest rests his lips against Hwoarang's mouth, tastes smoke and oil and spearmint; draws a kiss across to the arch of his marred cheek, down to the line of his jaw, and on the curve of his ear lobe.

Hwoarang's hand jolts up; grips the edges of Forest's face tight, causing the bones in his cheeks to creak.

"You better mean what you're saying," He whispers through clenched teeth, breath a rolling wisp on the cold. His voice cracks. "You better mean it."

There is a shake in Hwoarang's body. It rattles through; a slight and barely definable shiver.

Forest moves his tongue to answer, but Hwoarang's kiss is crushing and lacking in tenderness and the freezing iron of the bar is wrenched up against his back. They've both stumbled backwards, closer to bleared light and black water.

The fog carries up and around them, damp and dank and chilly. Hwoarang's mouth is moist and hot and as Forest pulls back, Hwoarang's teeth snag on his lower lip and pull.

And then…

"Will you stay?"

"I…" Forest ghosts the exposed part of Hwoarang's shoulder. "What was that?"

"I don't want to go back yet. The dojo was Baek's. Everything was Baek's."

His fingers twist in the back of Forest's jacket. He growls deep in his throat.

"Now I'm just…wandering. It's like what it used to be. Before Baek. Before _anything."_

_Before…_

The scar warps with Hwoarang's scowl.

Forest thinks of family and home and wide spaced gym floors. Of uniform little houses and peeling paint on old signs and the smell of petrol and fresh produce in the morning. Of ash and oil and the rumble of ancient Harleys.

And then he thinks of dashes of terracotta hair burning beneath sun and the rock of a bike straddled between his legs and hands, rough on his skin, and laughter, coarse and contagious. Of the brunt of muscle against bone, of the sweat clad sanctuary of dojo and bedroom, of wide and closed spaces, of freedom and progression.

"You just need a compass," He says softly.

"Will you come with me?'

"What do you want me do? Let down my hair from a tower?"

"No."

Somewhere above the smog, Forest is convinced there is a sky; dusky aquamarine, stretching far and wide and beyond.

"Tomorrow." Hwoarang is still close, still holding on. Forest closes his eyes and continues. "I'll leave a note. But you've got to be there at six, okay?"

He detects the tingle of breath against the jut of his collarbone.

.

.

The note is left curled by the fridge door. In his satchel are clothes, food, ingredients. Paul's old leather jacket that is too baggy on the shoulders. It had been a teenage birthday present. Dad had tsked and tutted, but on its back was a glaring skull and Forest had thought it was seriously cool, even if the colours had faded in the wash. His first medal, given to him by a father struggling to stay stern in the face of bursting pride. A picture of his mother, and the small travel recipe book she had brought for him, signed with her love.

He doesn't need much more. He'd once thought that crowding himself with things; ornaments, notes, shoes, busted up disk drives, and everything else that lay forsaken in his dark bedroom, would have helped construct for him a study little world of his own making. Little keepsakes and mementos and silly bits of junk that held value to him only.

But now, it's like a way has parted. The roads ahead are wide and wild, dangerous and sparse, and so he attaches to himself a few things and leaves the rest behind to define something else. Something long past.

He doesn't know how he came to first taste freedom, maybe from the blood in his mouth at that first fight or the rattle of a rock at his window frame or the feel of a body, trembling and taut, sliding down his back. He doesn't know where to break these experiences, doesn't know where to take them apart and analyze their separate edges. And whether if they did break, they would be fair and break even.

But freedom waits through the door.

"Took you long enough. You ready?"

"Yeah."

And it had never looked so damn perfect.


End file.
